It is well-known in the construction industry to build walls and/or complete window or other types of wall openings of glass blocks which are conventionally mortared together in aligned rows and columns. These type of block wall constructions are used where one wishes to close off a wall opening in a substantially stationary manner but would like to allow as much light as possible to pass through the wall and into the interior of the construction.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,114,337 issued Sep. 19, 1978 to Walther C. Neuhardt describes and illustrates a glass block construction wherein a configuration of spacer means is used within the mortar joints between adjacent blocks to insure a uniform spacing between the blocks during wall construction. The particular spacers are characterized by cross or T-elements which have widths corresponding to the desired distance between adjacent blocks in both vertical and horizontal directions of the construction and these remain within the mortar joints and thus become a functioning and load bearing element of the construction.
In more recent years, replacements for glass block type constructions have been suggested and these comprise lookalike plastic blocks which are molded to include various type of tab members which form part and parcel of the block structure. The tabs are interlocked by various techniques and this is to facilitate maintaining a uniform spacing between adjacent blocks of the construction as well as to stabilize the construction during the time that a worker places a grouting material within and between the joints of adjacent blocks.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,891,925 issued Jan. 9, 1990 to Marlon Carlson et al describes and illustrates a particular plastic block construction wherein a plastic block is characterized by flanges extending around the perimeter of both of the frontal and rearward faces of the block and these will bear against like flanges of adjacent blocks to insure consistent and even spacing between blocks of the construction. The flanges have corner extensions which are characterized by T-shaped cavities and two such extensions of adjacent blocks have their cavities interlocked together by a correspondingly T-shaped member. The T-shaped members are thus used to interlock adjacent blocks together in a unified construction.
More recently, molded plastic blocks have been configured with various type interlocking tabs which extend outwardly from the corners of the block and in planes parallel to the planes of the frontal and rearward face surfaces and the blocks of a construction are locked together when the tabs of adjacent corners are forcefully engaged by a worker as he constructs a block wall structure. Thus, the interlocked tabs not only maintain a uniform spacing between adjacent blocks of the construction but they also function to hold the blocks together in a unified manner.
These more recently configured plastic blocks, while providing an excellent technique for assembling a unified block wall structure, are deficient in that the blocks may be moved laterally out of alignment relative to each other in a direction transversely to the planes of either of the frontal or rearward face surfaces. This misalignment may occur during assembly of a wall or it may occur after such assembly due to wind and/or object impact forces against either of the frontal or rearward faces since the interlocking tab configurations act only in the planes of the frontal and rearward faces to retain the blocks in their spaced relationship to each other. The tab configurations do not act to retain block alignments in the transverse direction of the frontal and rearward faces or, more simply stated, in the lateral direction of the block edgewalls or side face surfaces.
Because of this deficiency, a need exists for a means to prevent block misalignments in the lateral direction of the side faces especially when the blocks include a configuration of tab extensions which are interlocked together during the placement of blocks in a way construction. Further, it is also desirable to be able to connect blocks in a subassembly for transport to a final assembly site without having them shift out of alignment.
It is a primary object of the present invention to provide a spacer means which may be used in plastic block wall constructions to prevent any relative block motion and/or lateral side-to-side movement between adjacent blocks of the construction when such blocks are interlocked together by tab type extensions.
Another object of the invention is to provide an easily manufactured spacer means which may be applied to plastic block constructions, the spacer means being made from the same or similar materials as the blocks whether they are transparent, translucent, and/or opaque to prevent any relative movement between adjacent blocks in a direction parallel to the axis of the spacer means.
A further object of the invention is to provide various configurations of economically manufactured spacer means which may be incorporated into plastic block wall constructions at the time that the blocks are oriented and placed within the wall by a worker such as to prohibit any relative lateral side-to-side movement of adjacently interlocked blocks in the direction of either the frontal and/or rearface surfaces during wall assembly and after such assembly.
A still further object of the invention is to provide a spacer means which will assist in securely fastening a subassembly of blocks together for transporting them to a final assembly site.
These and other objects of the present invention will be more fully apparent and appreciated from a consideration of the specification and attached drawings.